what we do not know about race

What We Do Not Know about RaceAuthor(s): Wilton Marion KrogmanSource: The Scientific Monthly, Vol. 57, No. 2 (Aug., 1943), pp. 97-104Published by: American Association for the Advancement of ScienceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/17955 .

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THE SCIENTIFIC MONTHLY AUGUST, 1943

WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW ABOUT RACE By Professor WILTON MARION KROGMAN

DEPARTMENTS OF ANATOMY AND PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

WE are, in t:his discussion, going to focus upon race and problems of race purely from a biological angle. The approach may be illustrated by an ex- perience the writer had some dozen years ago. In 1930-31 it was his privilege to study in the Galton Laboratory of Ap- plied Eugenics at London University. On the first day, as he ascended the stairs to a second-floor classroom, he saw on the landing-wall in front of him a huge illus- tration, an enlargement of a cartoon that had appeared i:n Punch. Two English country gentlemren were standing beside a blue-ribbon bull, and one gentleman said to the other, "We know about breeds in animals, but what about ourselves? " The theme of this discussion is, then: What about breeds in our biological selves ? We shall discuss these selves not in individual, but in group terms. In a very real sense what we do not know about human biological groupings may become positive knowledge if it outlines future avenues of research. If we recognize a darkness we also recognize a need for light.

The first "don't" is simply this: we are not sure--at least we do not agree- what actually constitutes a biological race in man. Iri 1871 Charles Darwin, in "The Descent of Man," expressed the problems of racial classification quite clearly:

Every naturalist who has had the misfortune to undertake the description of a group of highly varying organisms, has encountered cases . . . precisely like that of Man, and if of a cautious disposition he will end by uniting all the forms which graduate into one another, under a single species; for he will say to himself that he has no right to give names to objects which he can not define.

Darwin represents one extreme: there is but one race, the human race. One may study the literature on human racial classification and go to the other extreme, wherein no less than 150 species, each with sub-races, are postulated.

In 1735 Linnaeus, the great Swedish naturalist, gave Man the scientific name he to-day still bears-Homo sapiens (the "wise man"). Let us analyze ourselves biologically: an expanded cerebral cor- tex that makes of us a reasoning animal; a protracted period of infancy and child- hood that enables us to be a learning animal; a facial skeleton reduced in size so that we have a physiognomy instead of a snout; a forelimb that is freed from locomotion so that a forepaw has become a hand; a spinal column, viscera, a pelvic girdle, and a hind limb, that are reasonably well adapted to an upright posture and bipedal locomotion. In this general morphological pattern all mankind is truly one: one genus, one species. In all important and major bodily details we are one-in brain, in peripheral nerves, in heart, in blood and blood vessels, in all

97



98 THE SCIENTIFIC MONTHLY

viscera, in muscles, and in skeletal arehi- tecture.

But there do exist differences which are, as it were, superimposed upon this basic ground-plan. There are differences in skin color, in eye color, in hair color and hair texture, in head shape, in nose and lip shape, and even in limb proportions. These differences are obvious, they are external, and we have recog- nized them for thousands of years. On the basis of skin color, principally, we subdivide Homro sapiens into three major groups: White, Yellow, Black. 'Scientifi- cally we may designate these as H. s. caucasoideus, H. s. mongoloideus, H. s. negroideus, respectively.' Each of these groups-in practice we often call them "stocks"-is a sub-species, and each has certain distinctive morphological features which, taken singly, are not neces- sarily mutually exclusive, but which, taken in combination or complex, do tend to set the groups apart. Actually, this same general conclusion applies to sub-species in lower forms as well.

So far, so good. Now let us observe one of these stocks-the Caucasoids-in greater detail. Within this sub-species, in Europe, there are groups which, originally on a geographical basis, precipitate out as more or less recognizable entities: Northwest, Central, Southwest, North- east, Southeast. To these types-and we here use a simplified terminology-have been applied the names Nordic, Alpine, Mediterranean, Baltic and Dinaric, respectively. They fall into place in our scheme as follows:

H. s. caucasoideus nordicus " " " ~~alpinus "mediterraneus

balticuS2 dinaricuS2

In this stock break-down we come, finally, to the groups that the anthro-

pologist generally terms race; they are, in taxonomic fact, sub-sub-species, or varieties. Do they exist to-day? The answer must be a qualified affirmative; that there may be local, isolated, probably highly inbred groups of Alpines, for example, in certain Swiss valleys. Simi- larly there may be small regional groups of the five Caucasoid varieties we have named. But there are no peoples or nations in Europe who are pure Nordies, pure Alpines, or pure anything else. In substance, there are no pure races: there are only populations in wvhieh two or more varieties are intermixed, and that intermixture began before the dawn of European history. Therefore, what we term races in Man are poorly defined, because they are not-as in races in lower forms-homogeneous; they are intermixed, hybridized, diffused. That is why one man says "no races," the other "many races." The first is appalled at the difficulty of disentangling inter- mingled varieties; the second holds that secondary or composite groups warrant racial status.

The problem of mixture above mentioned-of hybridization so that "racial purity" is non-existent-renders it im- possible to ascribe genetic homogeneity to the races we have set up. Suppose we took ten persons classed as Nordies (five males, five females), and ten persons classed as Mediterraneans (five males, five females) and bred within each group: we could not guarantee, and we would not expect, that the offspring would be all Nordies and all Mediter- raneans, respectively. In the Nordic x Nordic we might get some short, brunet, long-heads; in the Mediterranean x Medi- terranean we might get some tall, blond, long-heads. About all we might reasonably expect is that the Nordic offspring would tend more to tall blondness, and the Mediterranean offspring to brunet shortness. In other words, the groups we call races are genetically hetero- geneous; they include genes that are gen-

1 Some anthropologists feel that these merit specific ranking.

2 There is reason to believe that these were originally variant combinations of the three pre- ceding, basic types.



WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW ABO(UT RACE 99

eralized, and that are also shared more or less equally by one another.

Actually, how have we in practice set up a racial classification? The first method is that of somnatological inspec- tion: we look at a group and find that, on the average, they are short, slender, dark-complexioned, long-headed, wavy- haired, and their habitat is eircum-Medi- terranean; thus H. s. caucasoideus mediterraneus comes into being (Italians, Spanish, southern French, etc.). The second method is by biometric analysis. Here a certain portion of an entire group -a random sample-,is measured and described precisely. If mathematical in- vestigation shows that this sample (and hence the group) is statistically homogeneous and significantly different from all other groups, then the group under consideration is termed a race. "A bio- metrician's concept of race in man is derived primarily from the statistical study of samples. ... His methods are essentially descriptive and they do not presuppose any particular theory of individual or racial heredity. "3 The end result of both of these methods is the l'homme moyen, or type, the hypotheti- cal individual who represents the aver- ages of all the individuals in the group (e.g., John Bull, Alphonse, Hans, Uncle Sam are caricatured types of an English- man, a Frenchman, a German, an Ameri- can).

In summary, our first "don't" recog- nizes that the groups we call human races are, taxonomically, sub-sub-species. As in all lower formns the differences which set these races apart--at such a taxonomic level-are not clear-cut and precisely defined. As far as Man is concerned, we focus upon a relatively few apparently stable characters and then accept them as having a definitive and diagnostic value. In doing this, however, we do not diverge radically from ae- cepted zoological prineples at sub-sub- specific levels f or lower animal forms

generally. At species level distinctions are quite clear; below that they are dim in the haze of variability.

The second "don't" is found in the fact that we are uncertain how stocks and races arose, i.e., when in human evolution they appeared and the mechanism invoived in their emergence. We are pretty well satisfied that Man, as a primitive hominid, probably arose some five million years ago, more or less, as the result of a divergence from a generalized anthropoid form which gave rise to Man and the Anthropoids as we to-day know them. But that ac- counts for Man as Man-how about the White Man? The Yellow? The Black? Well, we are not really sure. There are suggestive finds, but nothing more. The first White Man may possibly be seen in Galley Hill man, resident in England some 400,000 years ago; the first Yellow Man is suggested by Weiden- reich to date to Sinanthropus, the man of Peking, China, of about a million years ago; the first Black Man may date to Rhodesian man in Africa, 100,000 (?) years ago-certainly he was present in southern Europe at Grimaldi, some 25,000 years ago. We repeat, we are not sure of the import of these finds in terms of the time-appearance of stocks. Two things must be borne in mind: first, the finds are random and inconclusive because we do not have sufficient num- bers to know range of variation; second, the characters commonly diagnostic of stock or race are those of soft parts not preserved in the fossil record.

If stocks, or sub-species, be of doubt- ful origin, how about races, or varieties? Here we are more in the dark than ever. We can answer only that Mediterranean- type crania are found well defined by the opening of the Neolithic, about 10,000- 15,000 years ago; Nordic-type crania are reported in the Swedish Neolithic. The time element in stock and race emergence is approximate, nothing more.

Now that we have considered when they arose, let us take up how they arose.

3G. M. Morant, in "Race and Culture," p. 24, 1934. Royal Anthropol. Inst., London.




One of the most intriguing theories is that of Sir Arthur Keith,4 who feels that the endocrines may have played a role: "The transformation of man and ape ... is determined by a common growth-con- trolling mechanism which is residual in a system of small but complex glandular organs." As Keith surveys the role of the pituitary in acromegaly, the thyroid in achondroplasia, the adrenals in pig- mentation, the gonads in secondary sex characters, he sees analogies with certain statural, osteologic, cranio-facial, skin conditions in the stocks of mankind; e.g., the big-boned, rugged-skulled Caucasoid shows a possible pituitary dominanee; the flat-faced Mongoloid shows a possible thyroid dominance; the dark-skinned Negroid shows a possible adrenal dominance.5 Keith offers these endocrine as- sociations more as suggestions than as absolute statements. They undoubtedly exist as factors, but to-day we recognize the endocrines as so complex, so inter- related, that any statement of uniglandu- lar dominance must be taken with tre- mendous reserve. The exact role of the endocrines in human evolution and in the appearance of stocks and of races is in the realm of conjecture.

In our present knowledge of human evolution we assume that sometime, some- where, there existed a generalized proto- human or hominid species that had, potentially at least, all of the morphological characters found to-day in all of mankind. This species must have been genetically fairly homogeneous, though probably inherently variable.

From this species there arose through mutation, recombination, selection, mi- gration and isolation, the stocks and races as we now recognize them.

The third "don't" resides in the in- adequacy of our knowledge concerning heredity in Man. SDecifically. we do not

know the precise mechanism whereby traits diagnostic of stock and race are transmitted.

One of the most obvious methods em- ployed by the physical anthropologist in studying human heredity is to analyze the effects of race mixture.6 Here it is assumed that the traits that "show up" or persist in a cross are "dominant." For example, when a long-head is crossed with a broad- or short-head it is apparently the broadness or shortness that dominates; similarly, nasal breadth dominates over nasal narrowness, lip thickness over lip thinness, and so on. But all this is not genotypic (genetic constitution) it is phenotypic (physical appearance). We do not know the exact genetic pattern involved; we know, for the most part, only what the end-result "looks like." Moreover, we are observ- ing the operation of only a dozen or so pairs of thousands of pairs of genes in Man. It is this dozen or so for hair, eyes, nose, lips, skin, and a few other traits, that we rely upon for stock and racial diagnosis; all the others are presumably constant for all groups.

Strandskov has given us an excellent summary of known gene distribution in Man. Color blindness is a sex-linked recessive, with gene (cb) on the X-chro- mosome; color blindness is present when normal color vision (Cb) absent. Abil- ity to taste the chemical phenyl thiocar- bamide is an autosomal recessive with (T) for tasting, (t) for non-tasting. In the A-B blood groups we find inheritance -by triple allelomorphs, as follows:

Blood group Gene combination AB IA IB A IA IA or IAi B IB IB or IBi Ci

4 Keith, A., " The differentiation of Mankind into racial types." Ann. Rep. Smith. Inst., pp. 443-53. Wash., D. C. 1921.

5 About 1775 John Hunter concluded that the original skin color of Man was black, and in 1921 Keith reaffirmed that statement.

6 T. W. Todd, " Entrenched Negro physical features." I IHuman Biology, 1 (1): 57-69. 1929; W. M. Krogman, " The inheritance of non-pathological physical traits in Man. " Eugenical News 21 (6): 139-146. Nov.-Dee., 1936.

7 H. H. Strandskov, " The distribution of human genes," Sci. MON., 52: 203-215, March, 1941; " The genetics of human population," A,m. Nat., 76: 156-164, 1942.



WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW ABOUT RACE 101

In the M-N blood groups we find the fol- lowing:

Blood group Gene combination MM Am Am MN Am An NN An An

Biologically the knowledge of these few genetic patterns is important because the mechanism is identical for all human beings; the inherited traits cut straight across stock anid race; e.g., all blood groups and their genes are found in Whites, Yellows and Blacks, though in varying percentage combinations. It is possible that t;hese combinations may have some value in racial distinction, just as does skin color, etc., but as far as transfusibility is concerned (allowing for blood groups) all human blood is alike.8

We are certain that physical characters diagnostic of race and stock are hereditary: they arose genetically, via mutations and subsequent isolation; they have been perpetuated genetically in varying combinations. We know, for example, that there is an average of "one mutation for every 50,000 individuals per generation'" (Strandskov), and that most of these zmutations are of indifferent or even negative survival value. The few that are positive are transmitted and over a long period of time have entered into complexes and combinations which differ from stock to stock, and within stocks from sub-type to sub-type, from variety to variety. We are slowly but surely learning the genetics of Mankind in terms of his many physical-type vari- ants.

A fourth "don't" is really a corollary of the third, namely, we realize that dis- crete traits have a hereditary basis, but we are still not sure which of these traits are relatively stable and which are easily modifiable, so that the first set is useful

in classification, the second extremely limited in use.

In studying problems of racial analysis Hooton9 has outlined three categories of physical traits in Man: those that are non-adaptive, those that possess an ac- quired stability, and those that are easily modified. We may summarize these three categories as follows:

There are certain features which appear to act as heritable entities, either as unit characters or with multiple factors. These comprise in general hair-color and eye-color, form of hair, eye- fold, nose, lips, ear, incisor teeth and vertebral border of scapula, head breadth, face length, chin prominence and prognathism, and limb proportions, including intra-membral, inter-membral and trunk-limb ratios. These physical characters are non-adaptive, stable, fixed, and may quite reasonably form the basis of the assess- ment of racial distinctions. Furthermore, certain combinations of these traits, varying within natural boundaries, result in the establishment of subgroups within each major classification.

We come now to several traits which have in the course of time been functionally modified and by selection have become more or less stabil- ized; at least their variability is of intra-racial rather than inter-racial magnitude. Here we may include skin color, shape, size, and propor- tion of the malars and the palatal arch, head height and brain volume, and possibly certain caleaneo-gastrocnemic relationships. The list is small and its import uncertain; the farther we go in our study of individual growth patterns and their probable relation to presumed racial criteria the more we must allow for modifiability. It may be that the stability is spurious, merely a transitory phase in the creation of an ultimate pattern dictated by constitutional vicissitudes.

Finally, there are a number of bodily features so directly susceptible to health, diet and food habits, climatic factors, gait, exercise, occupation and other miscellaneous influences as to render them useless as racial criteria. Here must be mentioned height, weight, thoracic dimensions and proportions, nasal proportions, facial width, proportions of forearm and hand, relationship of vertebral column and pelvic girdle, and shaft proportions of femur and tibia.

It may be finally emphasized that we must, in problems of racial interpretation, pay general attention to the sum total of all bodily traits, but specific and critical attention to the non- adaptive bodily characters, for these are transmitted regardless of the multifarious and complex extraneous factors of the environment. All -things equal. it is not one. not two. but the

8 It is implied in the phrases " blood-relation" or "blood will tell" that somehow blood is a carrier of familial relationship. The blood group is itself inherited, but blood, per se, is not a vehicle of ge:netic transmission.

-E. A. Hooton, " Methods of racial analysis. " Science, 53: 75-81. 1926.




majority or all of the traits, in unique combination, which really constitute racial or group differences. But until we know more of the heredity of the several traits, of the effect of the growth-pattern upon these traits, we can not truly assess them in terms of non-adaptivity, ae- quired stability, or modifiability.10

For the last thirty years we have had reason to doubt the stability of certain morphological features, as in the cephalic index studies of Boas and his students, wherein significant generational differences were observed when foreign-born parents and American-born Jews and Sicilians were studied. In recent years Shapiro1" has suggested that instability is characteristic of a majority of Man's physical racial traits. He studied three generations: (1) " sedentes, " native parents born and still resident in Japan; (2) Japanese-born (of these parents) who migrated to Hawaii in their late 'teens; (3) Hawaiian-born children of these immigrants. The anthropometric battery comprised twenty-eight measurements with twenty-one derived indices and twenty-two observations. When the first two generations were compared it was found that they differed significantly in all traits measured and observed as follows: male, 72.4 per cent.; female, 67.9 per cent. As between the second and third generations the corresponding differences were 55.2 per cent. and 42.9 per cent., respectively. These differences are progressive from sedentes, to immigrants, to Hawaiian-born, but whereas between sedentes and immigrants disproportionate changes occur, between immigrants and Hawaiian-born proportionate changes are the rule. The progression is apparently a real one, relatively unaffected by age-changes or changes in occupational status. The causes of the changes are twofold: the immigrants probably constituted a sub- group of the sedentes population from which they were drawn; the new environment (of Hawaii) provided a

stimulus toward change and some in- breeding intensified the variant exempli- fied by the immigrants. But the changes are, of course, limited in extent-the Japanese in Hawaii, as long as they marry within their own group, will always be Japanese; biologically they will not, can not, become Hawaiians, even though there might be some environmen- tal convergence.

We now regard human races as much more plastic than we formerly did. But our concept of plasticity is basically a genetic one. There are a multitude of genes which encompass the entire range of human physical characters. Plasticity resides principally in recombinations of these characters. Recently Mills12 has shown that there is another phase to this plasticity, an environment (diatetic) aspect. He found that vitamin B re- quirements (thiamin, pantothenic acid, and pyroxidene at least) are much higher in the tropic than in a temperate zone, and that growth and development are inhibited by inadequate B intake under tropical living conditions. Here is an example where growth-pattern and hence adult configuration (taken as a racial criterion) is modifiable by the food environment. We are just beginning to learn how a temperate-zone White man may possibly adjust to a subtropical or tropical habitat, but for one fact we know there are 100 questions that are still to be answered.

The fif th "don't" is found in the func- tional aspects of Man: we know little about the physiology of race-types. We have studied racial metabolism, pulse- rate, respiration-rate, and so on, but these analyses are not so much tests of race-groups per se as reflections of conditions under which they live. There is no reason, really, to assum-e difference in kind, rather only differences in degree. If we relate body-type to body-function then distinct group differences can not be

10 W. M. Krogman, op. cit., pp. 144-145. 11 H. L. Shapiro (with F. S. Hulse), " 'Migra-

tion and environment. " Oxford U. Press, N. Y. 1939.

12 C. A. Mills, " Climatic effects on growth and development, with particular reference to the effects of tropical residence. " Amer. Anthro- pol., 44: 1-13. 1942.



WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW ABOUT RACE 103

expected, for body-type cuts across stock- and race-lines.13

There is another phase of the func- tional problem which requires classification, viz., so-called "racial immunities" and "racial s-usceptibilities. " For example, the peoples of North Europe are said to be prone to whooping cough, re- sistant to goiter and cretiiiism; the peoples of Central Europe fall prey to goiter and cretinism, b ut withstand pulmonary diseases; the American Negro succumbs to tuberculosis, diseases of heart, lungs and kidneys, and more successfully com- bats malaria, yellow fever, measles, scar- let fever and diphtheria.14 Are these really racial difflerences? Probably not. The answer is more likely to be found in problems of relative isolation and ex- posure, and most certainly in considera- tions of socio-economic standards. There are, so far as we know, no genetico-racial biological differences in the organs which will conduce to, or inhibit, organic break- down under the onslaught of disease. The problem, however, is still one to be explored.

The sixth and final "don't" is that we do not know of any characteristics, either biological or psychological, that in a given race-cross are superior or inferior. On the biological side there may be one exception, viz., the sickle-shaped erythro- cyte which is an autosomal dominant trait (Si) fould only among Negroes, to the extent of 4 per cent.

Much is being made these days of ''race superiority" and "race inferiority." In words of one syllable there is no such thii,g.t'5 One hears of the woods-

man who, on a crowded city street, heard a cricket; he can be matched by the me- chanic who in the turmoil of a machine- shop hears a bearing-knock in an engine four rows removed. Again, there is the savage whose keen eye sees vast distances or detects a faintly-trodden blade of grass; he can be matched by the scien- tist who uilder the microscope sees a new world in a drop of water. The ear and eye are common human possessions as far as morphology is conicerned-it is the degree of their training that differs. This type of reasoning can be applied to any phase of Man's activities: how he learns and how much he learns is dependent upon his cerebrum and upon the cultural framework within which he learns; the cerebrum is the constant fact9r, the cultural framework, the variable. The same holds true for "intelligence," however it may be defined and assessed. We repeat that biological superiority and inferiority in the stocks and races of man do not exist, and that biologically there is no valid bar to stock- and race-mixture. The first generation hybrids are niot biologically inferior-it is Society and not Nature that stamps the brand of unde- sirability.

In recent years German anthropologists have, as we know, advanced pre- posterous claims of Nordic or "Aryan" superiority (Das Herrenvolk). Such claims have no basis in fact. They have also claimed that widespread race-crossing ("race bastardization") will have a dysgenic effect ("gene chaos"), leading to various bodily abnormalities and asymmetries. This, too, is far more f an- ciful than real, though Fleming,16 an English anthropologist, has found some slight evidence of dento-facial dishar- monies in Negro-White hybrids crossed with Negro-Chinese and Chinese-White hybrids. But this evidence is not con- clusive, for there is no guarantee that growth inadeqaciiies rather than genes

13 P. Weidenreiclh, "iRasse und Korperbau." Springer, Berlin, 1927.

14 A. Hrdlilka, "Immunity as the chief task of future medicine, " Lit. Digest. Dec. 9, 1933 (see p. 14); see also J. H. Lewis, " The biology of the Negro." U. of Chicago Press. 1942.

15 Otto Klineberg, "Race differences." Har- pers, N. Y. 1935. W. M. Krogman, "Is there a physical basis for race superiority?'" Sci. MON., 51: 428-434, 1940; M. F. Ashley Mon- tagu, "Problems and methods relating to the study of race. Psychiatry, 3 (4): 493-506. 1940.

16 R. M. Fleming, "Physical heredity in human hybrids. " I Annals Eugen., 9: 55-81. 1939.




are to blame, i.e., that malnourishment has not modified a genetic pattern. As matters now stand the crossing between sub-species or stocks is socially so unac- ceptable that only lower social strata are involved. It is precisely here that en- vironmental impact and modification- in terms of insufficient and incorrect foods, improper hygiene, health hazards -are at their maximum. We have no adequate basis, therefore, for a true as- sessment and interpretation of the solely biological effects of stock-crossing. As far as we know the genetics of stocks and races, we need not, a priori, expect any biological maladjustment.

This discussion has been pretty much on the negative side-a sort of "hit parade " of scientific uncertainty with respect to race biology: we are not agreed what a race is, we are not sure when and how races arose; we do not know the precise hereditary mechanism in race; we are not sure which physical traits in race are stable, which modifiable: we do not know physiological and immunolog- ical features of race-groups; we can not assess race in terms of superiority and inferiority. In very truth we know little about the bio-genetical aspects of race.

Despite the foregoing avowal of inadequate knowledge we venture to present a definition of race that is sufficiently generalized to include the variables of physical type, heredity, environment and habitat:

A race is a sub-group of peoples possessing a definite combination of physical characters, of genetic origin; this combination serves, in varying degree, to distinguish the sub-group from other sub-groups of mankind, and the combination is transmitted in descent, providing all conditions which originally gave rise to the definite combination remain relatively unaltered; as a rule the sub-group inhabits, or did inhabit, a more or less restricted geographical region.

Certainly the physical anthropologist is not so dogmatic about the clarity of distinction between racial groups as he once was. Indeed, there are those who

would deny the existence of human races, and who advocate dropping the term entirely. If the term race is purely genetic, and if we do not know the genetic make-up (the genotype) of a presumed race-group, then it follows that we can not define the group genetically, and therefore it does not exist as a homogeneous genetic entity. This argument, as the present writer sees it, while biological on the face of it, stems more from a cultural misinterpretation of the term ("racism"), wherein race and national- ism are confused, than from considera- tions of presumedly diagnostic morphological characters.

There do exist certain groups which may be put into categories; i.e., there are groups which tend to precipitate out when defined by a certain physical trait- complex. The trouble resides in the fact that the trait-complex has been too rig- idly defined,, with too little allowance made for variability. The physical anthropologist freely admits that his classification has been based on the pheno- type-the few external features used in diagnosis. We are prepared to reclassify upon the basis of the genotype-the basic genetic constituency. In both instances we will have groups called races: in the first instance-the present-day method- groups are classified by what they look like physically; in the second instance -the emerging bio-genetic method- groups will be classified by what they are genetically.

The term race as we use it today is a recognition that group differences do in fact exist. It does not imply, scien- tifically and biologically, a homogeneity such as demanded by geneticists. When our knowledge of human heredity enables us to classify the peoples of the world genotypically we will gladly accept that classification-we will substi- tute it for the one we now have. Until then, and with full and complete recognition of all of its many inadequacies, we will use the system at hand.



what we do not know about race

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